www.federaltimes.com [relevant page no longer available]
The proposed revisions substantially affect the local administration of the CFC, the financing of the program, and the operation of federations.
The current system of local campaign zones administered by PCFOs and supervised by LFCCs (see earlier posts for explanations of these terms) will be replaced.
OPM indicates that it will establish “campaign regions,” the boundaries of which OPM will set.
For each region, OPM will appoint federal employees to serve as members of a “Regional Coordinating Committee” which may, in turn, hire an organization to provide “regional operating marketing support.”
OPM will contract with one or more “Central Campaign Administrators.” The draft regs suggest two main areas of activities for these administrators:
- Developing and running a central CFC website that would include the capacity for online charity applications and online donor pledging, and
- Handling pledges and the disbursement of donations.
II. The Costs of the CFC
The operation of the Regional Coordinating Committees, the regional marketing support, and the Central Campaign Administrators will be paid by the participating charities. The draft regs provide no detail on how high these fees will be but the fees will be non-refundable whether the charity withdraws its application or fails to meet CFC eligibility criteria.
III. Federations
Federations will continue to screen the application of member charities and will forward CFC donations to their members. Federations will not be allowed to deduct fees or other charges from CFC funds and must disburse CFC donations at least quarterly.
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There is a lot here, and we are still reading.
We support the shift of the cost of the program to the participating charities, but have already begun to express our concern that a single flat participation fee could lead hundreds if not more than a thousand national charities to leave the CFC. Many thousands of local charities could also depart.
We are also pleased that OPM is tackling the confusion regarding federation fees. We will be releasing our own report on federation fees as early as next week.
We welcome the reactions of those in the CFC who will be affected. I suspect OPM will want to hear from people as well.